EP
by Sara Nublas
Summary: <html><head></head>Emily deals with her ghosts after being back in the field with the team on a challenging case.  SPOILERS to Lauren  6x18 . Third part of my post-Lauren series, set after What's left of me.</html>
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** _This is the third, and last, part of the series Volver. No beta even for this story, but I always happy to read your comments_

_Thanks a lot to miaa29 for poking my curiosity and setting my muse on this path. Hope you like it :)_

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><p><strong>E.P.<strong>

The room is perfectly silent and still, the rhythmic tick of the clock is the only clue of the time flowing.

The man sitting at his desk raises his head from the file he's reading, he puts off his glasses and looks at the woman sitting in front of him "So Agent Prentiss, I read here you had an excellent physical evaluation"

"I kept myself in shape" she answers politely, but not kindly. She's never liked shrinks.

"Well, I'm sure the results of our session won't be less brilliant" he leans toward her offering candies from a silver box that she refuses.

_This room is quiet and still, a faint aroma of lavender is floating in the air, a shelf beside the window displays a selection of psychology essays; some pictures of natural landscapes are hanging on the wall together with the framed diploma which reassuringly certifies that I'm speaking with Doctor Malloy, a real professional straight from Yale. This fake neutral atmosphere is managing to make me feel more and more uncomfortable, like if I was in the waiting room of my dentist._  
>'<em>And you WILL attend physical and psychological evaluations', Hotch's demand rings loud in my head.<br>I'm complying with that request, I've already spent half of the scheduled hour in the studio of a perfect stranger mainly staring at the walls or answering his questions with yes, no, and occasional shrugs.  
>After all I haven't been required to be cooperative.<em>

"Agent Prentiss, is there something you want to talk about?" he catches her attention again, hoping an open question can loosen her up.  
>"Like what?"<p>

"I don't know. Nightmares, difficulty to concentrate, flashbacks, irritability, insomnia… It's been one month since you came back to the BAU, you've mainly been assigned to a desk job and joined your team on the field a couple of times. How did it feel?"

"Good"

The doctor arches his eyebrow like a disappointed teacher "Can you elaborate the notion of good?'

"It felt good" she elaborates "As if I was doing my job and not wasting my time finding synonyms for the word good"

"I understand your frustration Agent Prentiss, but it's my task to evaluate if you're ready to go back to your original assignment or if.."

"Or if I'm suffering from PTSD." She completes his sentence, "the answer is no. I sleep quietly and regularly; I don't have flashbacks, outbursts or difficulties to concentrate. I eat healthy and I don't hug the bottle when my day's over" she answers coldly, not a twitch to betray the truth.

The doctor stares back at her with curiosity, then he leans on the back of his leather chair and lets a deep breathe out "Emily, I read your file, all of it. I know your curriculum and I frankly find it… impressive; deep undercover work, excellent compartmentalization skills, the confrontation with Ian Doyle, the months on the run. Even for a tough cookie like you it's a lot to take in…"

She stares back at him, not exactly flattered by the definition 'tough cookie'. Malloy senses her diffidence and chuckles while he wipes his glasses with the rim of his shirt "Agent Prentiss, I promise I don't want to challenge you or to add troubles to the pile. I'm here to help you" he reassures with a frank expression, then he checks his glasses and, satisfied with his cleaning job, put them back on his desk "As far as I'm concerned you can come here and stare at the wall or use this time in a more valuable way. It's up to you, but it doesn't change the fact that at some point you'll have to talk to me" It's always tough to evaluate an agent, especially a profiler and truth to be told Malloy likes this one, but she's not making his job any easy.

Emily, unimpressed by the friendly talk, watches at the clock: twenty minutes to go. She actually doesn't dislike this man, he's just doing his job and he really seems motivated in assessing her psychological fitness without prejudice, but there are some things that you just can't say, especially when you know that the final report will be handed in to Strauss. So far her plan is to watch her words carefully and stall him until this session is over, until he decides she's fit to go back to work and frees her from this torture. So far it's working out fine. More or less.

Finally a response to her prayers comes in the form of a call. Hotch_._

"It's work, I have to take this" she jumps up from her seat with a bit too much enthusiasm.

The doctor stares at her while she walks toward the door "How many times did you visit your grave?"

She freezes with her hand on the doorknob.

He got her - _sneaky son of a..-_ he waited for the moment her defenses would be low to strike and score.

"Do you panic when you don't have work to do? Do you identify with the victims or the unsub? Do you ever think you came back broken?"

Silence.

He doesn't expect a reply, he doesn't need it. He just wanted to remind her she's not the one calling the shots in this game and he succeeded.

Her hand is clenching the doorknob so hard that her knuckles turn white; to fight back the fear when it nags her and to deceive the uneasiness in front of her friends is one thing, but to hear those dreaded questions voiced out loud by a stranger is a noxious feeling, it makes her feel weak, exposed, vulnerable.

"If the answer to even one of these questions is yes, I suggest you to find someone to talk to, either me or someone else. Because it's not going away, it's just going to get worse"

She turns to him regaining her cold demeanor, "Thank you for your time, Doctor Malloy" she leaves the room with a feeling of defeat; tricked in such an elementary way.

_Emily Prentiss, you're a stupid woman in a sea of troubles._

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><p><em>To be continued..<br>_


	2. Chapter 2

_-thanks to miaa29 for poking my curiosity and setting my muse on this path_

_-No beta even for this story, but I'm always happy to read your comments_

_-Given that I'm not an expert in criminology or psychology, I profusely apologize if the profiling part in the following chapters is a mess. I tried to do my best to make it believable, so please, bear with me. Nonetheless I'm absolutely interested in any comment and suggestion you can provide :)_

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><p>"Three women killed in the last ten days. The unsub strangled them, cut their hair, painted their nails and staged the bodies" Hotch details the case, while the gruesome pictures of three women in their thirties flash on the screen; Garcia promptly turns her gaze and waits for a hint from Morgan to look back at the screen.<p>

"Any sign of sexual assault?" Emily asks.

"No, but the unsub beat them pretty badly, also the coroner found ligature marks on wrists and ankles" Reid answers skimming fast through the pages of the report.

"The haircut, the nail polisher, the staging of the body; it seems he's trying to recreate some kind of fantasy" Morgan comments.

"He chooses his victims, kills them in their apartments and turns them into grotesque dolls" Emily adds with a sting of despise in her voice "this requires time and study"

"And experience" Rossi adds, "This guy is not a newbie."

"Still he doesn't focus on a precise type or on a specific geographic area" Reid remarks looking at the file "It seems he's still making up his mind."

"With such a short cooling off period it won't take him long" Rossi counters "As he practices he gets smarter and enjoys it more and more".

"Seems to me he's already enjoying it enough" Emily asserts bluntly, gaining a long inquiring look from Morgan.

"Wheels up in one hour. Emily you're with us on this one" Hotch briefly states before leaving the room.

As soon as they land, Hotch meets with the detective in charge of the investigation, Rossi and Reid go to the scene of the second crime, and Emily heads with Morgan to the apartment of the last victim.

It's almost dusk and a police officer is waiting for them at the door "Be careful with all those glasses" he warns.

"The glasses?" Emily asks.

"Your guy broke the light bulbs and shattered the mirrors, the floor is covered with fragments. Watch out" he explains.

The profilers enter the house with their flashlights on, carefully surveying the space and observing the scene.

_Crick, crack, crick, crack, crick, crack._

"So, the unsub wants to be in control. He plans carefully his steps, stages the bodies, doesn't show any sign of remorse," Morgan assesses walking ahead "but then he loses control and shatters at the mirrors. This guy is all over the place."

"Seems he hasn't decided yet what he wants to be" Emily maintains pensive.

The rhythmic noise of the broken glasses and the dim light of the torches make the atmosphere sinister.

_Crick, crack, crick,crack, crick, crack._

_I hear Morgan's words fading somewhere far from me. _

_I'm in another alley, another city, another me.  
>It's a dark, dank aisle; I have to grope my way along the wall to avoid stumbling on the uneven floor.<br>The broken glasses crash under my heels, announcing my only presence in the eerie corridor. _

_The windows have been smashed and replaced with wooden panels, occasional rays of light pass through the cracks between boards, revealing scattered details of the inside of this building.  
><em>

_I remember of a game I used to play when I as a kid, when I lazily lay awake in my bed before starting the day and watched the light filtering through the blinds and dancing in my room; innocuous familiar features such as a fold in the blanket or the leg of a chair would turn into frightening monsters and ominous demons hiding in the dark and ready to prey on me. Only the reassuring daylight, flooding the room once I opened the blinds, would break the spell of darkness and erase my childish fears._

_The air is oppressing in here, the piercing smell of smoke, urine and sex hurts my nostrils and turns my stomach. I swallow, close my eyes and try not to inhale too deeply._

_My name is Erica Porter, I'm from Seattle and I'm here on business._

"So, the unsub comes from behind. Attacks the victim, kills her and arrange the body. Then he goes wild, breaks the lamps, the mirrors and leave?" Morgan shakes his head in frustration.

"Or maybe it's part of his devising. He breaks in, shatters the light bulbs and the mirrors and then waits for her to come home" Emily offers.

"Why all this preparation? It's way risky, the neighbors might hear the noise of the broken glasses; the victim could run away before he gets to her" he asks again.

"Because he wants to smell her fear surging after realizing something's wrong and right before resolving to run away. It's only then that he feels in power. After he killed her the game is over, so he has to arrange her body to relive the fantasy" there's distress in her voice, her breath labored, the last words come out almost choked.

Morgan can't see Emily's face in the darkness, but frowns at the sound of her voice. Something's really wrong and suddenly he feels the urge for switching on the light to see her face, to make sure she's fine. To make sure she's Emily.

_I knock the door and after a few seconds Cecile comes to open.  
>He's in his forties; he loves stating his rank through designed clothes, high-class hookers always at his side, expensive cars and long stripes of cocaine on the crystal table. But the truth is that he is and always will be a rat, who climbed the ladder by selling drugs to teenagers or putting them on the streets and one lucky day stumbled across a terrorist, Valhalla, who upgraded his business. Seven years ago he got caught in a big operation and saved his ass from jail by becoming a snitch, a well infiltrated one. Now if Doyle is around, Cecile knows it.<em>

_I follow him through the room, where he dismisses two half naked girls lying on the sofa, they're dressed as models and their ages summed together barely total thirty.  
>It's time to talk business; I talk, he sniffs.<br>He almost chokes on his stripe when I tell him I want to know Doyle's whereabouts; he's well aware that if he talks and Doyle finds out, he's a dead man; but if he doesn't talk then I'll spread the voice he's a snitch and he'll be a dead man, anyway.  
>I look at him impassive while I list three addresses by heart: his mother's, his sister's, his ex wife's and mother of his son. I don't lose my cool when he starts sweating and pleading and finally gives up the information I want.<em>

_I leave the apartment without looking back, repeating myself that he's a despicable creature, unworthy of pity or compassion, that I would have never used those addresses anyway, that I'm acting for the greater good.  
>My paces become faster and faster until I reach the main door almost running; when I dive into the harsh sunlight, I'm almost blinded. I stagger to an alley where I find a break from the steam devouring this summer day and I crouch down, vomiting my empty stomach.<br>This time the daylight is not enough to dissolve my demons; they stand boldly, laughing loud at my defeat._

Emily startles when Derek reaches for her shoulder "Hei, you ok?"

"Yes, absolutely" she smiles feebly while she tries to even her breathe.

"Prentiss, are you sure you don't want to sit out this case?" he asks on the way back to the car.

"Why?" she fakes bewilderment.

"Because your hands are shaking and it seems you just saw a ghost" he stops in front of the car surveying her expression, trying to decipher her elusive tone.

"I'm just tired" she justifies dodging his eyes "now let's focus on catching this guy, ok?"

Morgan gives her a concerned look before getting into the car; he knows whatever it is, it'll have to wait until the case is over.

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><p><em>To be continued...<em>


	3. Chapter 3

_Thanks to miaa29 for poking my curiosity and setting my muse on this path, and for the kind words of support._

_Please mind the reviews!_

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><p>They receive the news of the fourth homicide the following afternoon.<p>

They get to the house surrounded by police cars, two young agents are waiting for them on the doorsteps, their faces covered with frustration for getting too late and horror for the scene they just saw and will never forget.

Rossi, heading to talk to the detective, walks past them. He would really like to provide some comfort, they look like kids to him, but the truth is that there's no much he can say to fuel their secret hope. No, it doesn't get any easier; you just learn to cope with it.

As soon as they enter the room where the body lies on the bed, they are all struck by the contrast between the elegant, refined taste of the house and the vulgarity of the staged body turned into a cheap horrific doll. The haircut, the nail polisher, the lipstick make her look like a scarecrow, an image that differs strikingly from the woman portrayed in the picture on the bedside table.

A bottle of perfume lies broken on the floor, the sweet smell of rose and jasmine is filling the hair and mixing with the residues of smoke.

"He surprised her, but she was still able to put up a fight "Reid reconstructs the last moments of the victim's life "he tied her and lit a smoke. He took his time" he looks for confirmation from the other profilers.

Morgan nods walking toward him "Yeah. Emily's right, our unsub likes the foreplay, the victim's fear gets him off. But still, why staging the body in such a humiliating way?"

The two profilers notice that Emily left the room and exchange a glance.

"How is she doing?" Reid asks in a whisper.

"Don't know yet, but I'm keeping an eye on her. I guess we have to give her sometime" Morgan voices his hope, eyes desperately locked on the point where Emily was standing a minute before.

Reid remembers how hard his recovery has been after being held captive by Tobias Hankel; back in time he was in a familiar envirionment, surrounded by friends, safe from his torturer, but now that experience seems to him like a walk in the park compared to what Emily went through. He's not sure he can share Morgan's optimism; the illusion that time will heal may not apply to this situation. Sometimes you just can't go back.

"Hei guys, take a look at this" Emily call them from the bathroom "He broke the mirrors and the light bulbs in this house as well, just like the other two times"

"The coroner said she was killed at approximately 2 pm this afternoon" Reid states "What's the need to break the source of light, when it's not even dark?"

"Then it's part of his signature" Morgan concludes, I'll ask Garcia to find out if there were other the homicides with a similar MO in the past" he says heading out.

"So, how's my favorite secret agent doing back in the field?" Garcia asks before hanging up.

"She puts on the tough girl mask, but there's something off with her and I'm not sure she should work this case" Derek admits his doubts to his friend.

"Why? What happened?"

"We are looking for an unsub who ties and tortures his victims, how do you like it for a déjà vu?"

"Do you think she can handle it?" her words come out slower, as if the weight of her anxiety is hampering her ability to formulate a consistent thought.

"I don't know" Morgan surrender with a sigh after a pause "For sure it would help if she opened up with us instead of keeping everything inside. Gotta go now, baby girl" he shakes the frustration away and turns to Rossi, who has just finished talking to the neighbors.

"Worried about Prentiss?" the older agent asks.

"I'm not sure this is an easy case for her" Morgan answers.

"It's not, and I think Hotch picked it on purpose to see how she handles the pressure" the older agent scrutinizes Morgan's face while he clenches his jaw and swallows the objection that just came to his mind, "Derek, I know it's difficult but hovering constantly will not help her"

"So, what? We wait until she falls apart?" he snaps back "We've already lost two of our own this way, and the usual question after they left was whether we could have done something more…"

"This time is different. We're all keeping an eye on Emily. And we're all worried. What I'm saying is that choking her with our attention is not doing any good to her and to the case. Now let's go get this guy" he finally encourage walking back to the crime scene.

Inside the house Emily wonders through the rooms, trying to figure this unsub out. So sloppy and accurate, so in control and deranged at the same time. How does he choose them? Why does he beat and then stage them?

She turns around in frustration; the smell of cigarette makes Emily crave for a smoke, she quitted years ago, but Ellen didn't.

_Ellen Payton is a mess of her own. Half artist, half thief; always in troubles, always behaving nonchalantly about that. She walks through life with that smile of indifference typical of who just doesn't care, because she knows in someway she will always fall on her feet.  
>She's standing in front of a pole table, cigarette in one hand and stick in the other when Bill approaches her. He's all nerves and bones covered with tattoos; his dark eyes filled with greed and his rapacious face remind her of a vulture. Bill knows a guy, who knows a guy, who knows another guy and at the end of this lovely chain of acquaintances there's a forger, that's why Ellen is here.<br>She needs a new identity, one that official channels cannot track, one that she can use to do the dirty job without raising suspicions, and tonight Bill is her gateway to that anonymity.  
>The deal is that if she wins the game he'll introduce her directly to the forger skipping the long chain of intermediate contacts; Ellen doubts things are going to be that smooth but opts to play along, she prefers trying the diplomatic way before threatening the family jewels with a gun.<em>

_Ellen is one of the most dangerous alias I've used, after Lauren of course. She's a loose cannon and I never really feel comfortable in her skin, you know where you start, but you never know where you're gonna end; usually in an ugly place.  
>After a while I get tired of Bob's ogling "You know that in order to get somewhere with this game you should try to keep your eyes on the table. Don't you?" I suggest him flirtatiously, barely able to stop a retching; even Ellen has her limits.<em>

"_Sorry, honey" he smiles apologetically "but I can't help admiring the piece of fine art on your… heart… "He grins with voracity "A four leaf clover… I didn't imagine you were part of some Irish fan club" he mocks me._

"_My ex-boyfriend was" I answer not losing the concentration on the game, pushing away the memories of my last encounter with Doyle._

"_And what happened?" I can feel his eyes on me, his perverted mind fantasizing about scenarios I don't even want to imagine._

"_I flushed his engagement ring and it didn't take it very well.." I carry on with a flat tone._

"_So he branded you?" he becomes more interested, even excited. A rare and well-preserved specimen of Cro-Magnon, ladies and gentlemen._

"_He wanted to give me something I couldn't get rid of that easy…" I answer while I sink the eight ball._

"_And now what are you gonna do?" he asks me, avid._

"_I'm going to find him and place a bullet in his head" I grab my money from the table and get closer to Bill "and, unless you don't want to get stuck in the middle of this, you will take me to your friend forger and forget about me" I respond in kind while closing the distance._

_He slightly startles and his nostrils flare when he feels the barrel of the gun at his groin._

Emily walks again in the room with the feeling she's missing something she shouldn't. This unsub is patient, methodic, his MO is nearly amateurish but also well studied; he does what he does for a reason so what's the point of disfiguring them? Is he humiliating them? Is he punishing them? Is he...

"Emily, we have to go" Rossi's voice takes her back from her thoughts.

She turns to him wide eyes "He's branding them…" she blurts out, like if she just woke up from a dream.

Rossi looks back at her, oblivious to the uncanny path her mind has been following "What did you just say?"


	4. Chapter 4

_Thanks to miaa29 for poking my curiosity and setting my muse on this path. Also thanks a lot to everyone who read and reviewed!_

_Given that I'm not an expert in criminology or psychology, I profusely apologize if the profiling part is a mess. I tried to do my best to make it believable, so please, bear with me. Nonetheless I'm absolutely interested in any comment and suggestion you can provide :)_

_Please, mind the reviews._

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><p>"The unsub chooses sophisticated, elegant and successful women, and turns them into grotesque, cheap dolls" Reid talks to the whole team back at the police station.<p>

It's a collection of tired and frustrated eyes that is looking at him and at the pictures of the crime scenes. Every time they try to ensemble the profile, there's something out of place; they handled more complicated cases in the past, but looking at this helplessly incomplete puzzle, while all around bodies are falling like flies is getting unbearable. The tension is palpable and the detective in charge is starting to doubt the BAU can provide any real help.

"Still we don't understand how breaking the mirrors and the light bulbs fits with the profile" Rossi objects "Is it a way to claim he's invisible or is he ashamed of himself?"

"What if this is not something he does for himself, but a message he knows the victims would understand" Emily suggests.

"So you're saying that this is personal; he's getting even on something" Hotch intervenes.

"He's exposing their true identity; under the façade of elegance and respectability, to him they are just a grotesque camouflage" Emily concludes.

"I'll call Garcia," Morgan resolves "See if there has been any murder with a similar MO in the last years."

"Good job, Prentiss" Rossi congratulates "you might have just saved his next victim"

_It's a mild summer night when I walk through the door of the hotel in Washington. My name is Ellie Pierce, an elegant refined businesswoman; I walk with the self-confidence of who is used to play with power and is not afraid to show it, I make a good show of my elegant outfit and my posh manners as assumed for the clients in this highbrow atmosphere.  
><em>

_The waiter promptly gets my order; I repress the instinct to order a glass of Laphroaig and ask for a vodka Martini; then I sit in front of my contact, in the darkest corner of the almost deserted bar and smile politely, the way I would great an old friend I'm used to hang out with. Actually it's been a long time since I saw her in Paris.  
><em>

_I should feel relieved to get out of the gutter for a change, but honestly I've never felt so filthy and hypocrite as now; the heroic agent comes back home to report the results of her brave actions, she wears a nice dress, puts on a smile and everything gets wiped away, all the ignoble subterfuges, all the ruthless women I've been, all of it is remitted.  
>Other women, other names are responsible for those crimes, not me; my conscience is clean, free from sin and guilt.<em>

_I slide on the table the envelope with my report and stash in my bag the instruction JJ gives me. _

"_Did you get everything done?" she asks me with nonchalance._

"_All of it" I answer unperturbed "Are they all fine?" I add trying to keep my voice stable at the thought of the team._

"_They're doing well" She nods with half smile and walks away. _

_I stare at my drink and wonder if she could see the shadow on my face, I wonder if she knows what I had to do in order to get 'all of it' done, I wonder if she cares, if anybody cares. _

_Where does the line between licit and illicit lays? Where is the boundary between justified and unforgivable?  
>I wonder how many time I've crossed it so far and on which side of it I'm standing now. After all is there a real difference at this point?<em>

Emily's memories are interrupted by Garcia's voice, briefing them on her latest discovery "So my brave friends, there are no crimes similar to the present ones, but there were a series of unsolved murders two years ago; three girls attacked at night in isolated areas inside the local campus. The unsub broke the light bulbs in isolated areas and waited in the darkness" she explains satisfied of the fruitful search.

"So they weren't attacked in their own rooms?" Reid asks.

"Nope, the unsub attacked them on the way back from classes to the dorms…. All the girls were raped and strangled and their bodies dumped in plastic bags"

"Aside from the broken lamps the MO is completely different" Rossi objects "The killer in the campus was setting a trap and waiting for the opportunity. Our unsub chooses his victims and attacks them in their houses, staging the body afterward..."

"It's not the same unsub" Hotch concludes.

"Oh, so I wasn't useful" Garcia moans in disappointment.

"You were, baby girl. These episodes are definitely linked, we just don't know how" Morgan reassures her.

"Garcia, did they suspect someone back in time?" Prentiss asks.

"Yep. An assistant… Edward Portman… nine students reported inappropriate behavior… but the charges were dropped for lack of evidence. Turned out they were trying to get back at him for being expelled from his class after stealing a test. Naughty kids… his career was ruined, he lost his job, his wife divorced him and she got full custody of their daughter… he recently came back to town" Garcia confirms.

"Were the victims linked to this assistant?" Reid carries on.

"Yes, my genius! They were among the students who accused him" Garcia counters promptly, her hands moving on the keyboard faster than ever.

"How many of them are still in town?" Hotch asks.

"Three. Two girls, still studying in the same campus and a guy who dropped out of college"

"Morgan, Reid you go to warn one girl, Dave you are with me to check on the other. He never targeted males so there's no reason to start now" Hotch states "Prentiss you stay here and try to get a hold of the guy, just to be sure"

Hotch's glare is stern enough to discourage her from objecting his decision.

As soon as the rest of the team leaves and she boils down her frustration a thought starts morphing into her head. Emily Prentiss would follow the logical clues but something tells her this time she needs to think outside the box, to follow her instinct because so far nothing has been logical and consequential in this case.

She calls back Garcia while she looks again at the reports of the four victims; bills, phone calls, pictures of the scenes, god knows how much she could use Reid's eidetic memory in this moment.

"Right here, my friend" Garcia greets her with a sweet voice.

"Hei Garcia, how many guys accused Portman back then?"

"Ehm, just that one. Sean Caine" she answers perplexed.

"What does this guy do now?"

"Emily?"

"Just asking Pen"

"He was expelled from college when they discovered he organized the whole set up against Portman…"

"How did they find out?"

"Four girls turned him in … oh god"

"Let me guess, our victims?" Emily asks not surprised. She doesn't need a reply and carries on with the theory shaping into her mind "Portman had no reason to kill the women who tried to rehabilitate him, but it's a hell of a motive for Caine to get even with them and ruin Portman once for all. I guess I don't need to ask you for the address"

"Em, why do I think this isn't a good idea at all?"

"I'll call Hotch from the car and wait for back up, I promise. But I can't sit around while Caine kills someone else. Please" Emily insists.

Emily stops the car in front of the house, and runs toward the window to check the situation.

Hotch gave her clear orders, 'do not to make a move until the back up is there'.

She gets close to the house to get a visual of the inside. A man is tied to a chair into the living room and his nose is bleeding; a tall guy, pale as hell is frantically walking back and forth, screaming at something in a corner and waving his gun in the hair. It doesn't look good at all she thinks, while she looks around searching for any SUV approaching on the road.

At first she thinks the unsub is talking to Portman, then a slim figure comes into visual, her profile partially hidden, but familiar. Where did she see that face already?

The girl comes to stand in front of the unsub, she wipers something to his ear and he seems to calm down; then she turns and walk toward the window with a grin, she take a deep breath and closes her eyes, she's smiling with relief when she says something. That's it, now Emily remembers her, she's one of the two girls that the team went to warn. Caine did the dirty work but she's been calling the shots. Emily can't hear her talking, but it's not difficult to read her lips forming two unmistakable words 'kill him'.

Emily looks around again, the street is desert and empty; Hotch is going to be seriously pissed off.

There are no memories of her previous alias kicking in and providing some alternative point of views on the case. It's just her, Emily Prentiss, here and now. She walks through the unlocked entrance and creeps toward the room where the unsub is about to kill his last victim; her breath is heavy and labored, thin lines of sweat and framing her forehead. She steadies her hand and thinks the time has come to prove herself, to see if Emily Prentiss is still good for this job, if she can handle the tension and catch the bad guy.

All these doubts are whirling around her head, and yet she's hyperaware of everything around her, all her senses on alert. She doesn't flinch when she comes to face the unsub, standing few meters away with his gun leveled to her chest.

She has time just for a thought before everything comes down. _Game over._

Bang.

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><p><em>To be continued...<em>


	5. Chapter 5

_Thank you for reading and reviewing so far._

_This last chapter of this fic and closes the whole post-Lauren series; obviously I'm far from content with it, but I did it and undid it too many times so now I surrender... here it is._

_Feedback is always appreciated._

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><p>The SUV stops in the driveway with a shriek and the profilers jump out; as soon as they see one of their cars parked outside of the house but no trace of Emily, they frantically hurry up. Morgan is walking ahead gun in hand and Hotch follows behind, a livid mask of worry.<p>

When they hear the gunshot, their paces quicken dramatically and hold their breath. In a moment they are back in Boston in a dank abandoned building; in a moment they're again preparing to mourn a friend, in a moment the desperation takes over. How to handle the same loss twice?

Then they get to the room where the shot came from; Portman is tied to a chair and a girl they recognize as one of the potential victims, is glued to the wall, her face a mix of anger and incredulity. The gun is on the ground and the unsub is lying on the floor, hands twined behind his head.

Rage, fear, concern, resent, grief and many other unspoken feelings surge and fill the room paralyzing their minds and their muscles for an interminable instant, then they take in the scene and proceed to clear the room for the police, the CSI and the paramedics to step in taking care of their tasks.

Their job's over.

* * *

><p>"Oh my God!" Garcia holds her breath, eyes wide, leg twitching on her chair "..So turns out that Portman-the assistant was innocent, whereas Caine-the scammer was the unsub and he killed the girls who turned him in to the dean?" she asks confused, taking a sip from her glass.<p>

"Technically Caine wasn't the scam. He was more the executor of the plan" Reid clarifies "the other girl we found at the scene planned the false accusations against the Portman because he refused her advances"

"Then when Portman came back, she planned the ruse in order to frame him as the killer of the campus, and she tried to stage his suicide so he couldn't defend himself" Rossi concludes.

"What about the mirrors and the light bulbs?" Garcia asks still confused.

"She wanted to repeat the MO of the killer of the campus so the evidence would nail Portman" Morgan explains.

"But the killer of the campus was using the trick of the broken lamp to get an opportunity, while in this case the shattered mirrors suggested self loathing; the unsub wants to be invisible to himself and the others.." Garcia maintains, trying to find logic in those deaths.

"Oh, listen to you baby girl!" Morgan exclaims, "talking like a profiler. Should I watch my back now?"

Garcia gives him a nudge "Anyway, may this serve as a lesson to all of you" she warns with a grin.

"About what?" Reid asks.

"The things a woman can make you do…" she replies with a smirk that makes everybody chuckle, except Reid who looks at her lost.

"No, baby girl" Morgan corrects, "the things a nasty psychopath can make you do"

"Whatever…" she waves a hand playing with the umbrella in her cocktail "the gist is that you would be lost if our Emily hadn't figured it all out and saved the day" Penelope chants rising her glass followed by the rest of them.

As soon as the team made it back to the base, Garcia dragged them all out for a toast not leaving any room for a no; she almost lost one member of the family today, for the second time. She needs to feel them close, to look them in the eyes and make sure they're fine, that nothing is slipping through the sieve of her watch. And when she sees all her friends smiling and laughing she shifts on her seat keeping a sob of relief to come out and finally allows herself to breathe.

Everyone's ok, almost.

"By the way where's Emily?" Rossi asks.

"She had her last psychological evaluation, she'll catch up with us when she's done" Hotch responds.

"But she'll be fine. Won't she?" Penelope questions unable to mask her anxiety.

"She got back to the field with a pretty tough case" Morgan shoots Hotch a sharp glance "But she didn't lose it and nobody got hurt"

"So?" Penelope urges.

"So we'll take care of her and she will be okay" Morgan answers, staring down at his glass.

* * *

><p>"You never really believed that Portman was guilty. Did you?" Doctor Malloy asks curious after listening to Emily's recount of the case.<p>

"I hoped he was not guilty" she answers.

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. This guy lost his job, his family and his own identity and no matter what the others will think or remember, he will probably spend the rest of his life dealing with the consequences of that episode. I kind of understand what he's been through" she admits looking down at her hands.

"Do you think it would be easier for you if you could forget your past?" he asks calm and impassive

"I don't think I'd want to.." she shrugs "I fought fiercely to survive and nail Doyle, and there are many things I've done that I'm not proud of, but I don't want to walk away as if none of it ever happened. I can't."

"Then what do you want to do?"

"I want to face the consequences; I want a chance to get my life back on track and to forgive myself" as the answer comes out, it feels like she's been unburdened of a huge weight.

"Then you're on the right way to do that" Malloy smiles extending his hand, "I think we are done here. I don't have any reason to hold you back from your job… and your projects"

_I'm Erica Porter the merciless dealer, who taught me that the best way to walk out of a confrontation alive is to make your opponent believe you're a ruthless killer and won't hesitate to strike to his heart if you need to._

_I'm Ellen Payton the unrepentant troublemaker, who keeps her scars in plain sight to remind herself how she got here and where she's headed, and to warn people she's not a woman to cross. _

_I'm Ellie Pierce the polished businesswoman, who stashes the dirt under the carpet and swallows her secrets down with her vodka Martini. She puts up a smile and delivers the results; when asked she answers that everything went fine and the mission was accomplished successfully, she knows nobody wants to hear what happened behind the curtain, and if she's fool enough to have a conscience, that's her own damn problem exclusively._

_I'm Emily Prentiss the defiant FBI agent, who risked everything in order to obey to her heart and protect the ones she loves, who came back with many doubts and few answers, seeking the truth and looking for redemption, and spends endless nights in front of her grave wondering what's going to be of her now._

_I can be whoever you ask me to be; no truest camouflage could conceal my broken identity._

_They told me to leave the past behind and offered me a free pass to forget what I did and leave those women in a dark corner. Let Emily Prentiss be again; fidelity, bravery, integrity. _

_But I'm afraid I don't know anymore how to be me without these women at my side, I cannot be me without facing what they left behind. Atonement is the only possible way to cope with my past, so if I do enough good, if I save enough lives, if I protect my family and I'm loyal to my friends, if I fulfill my oaths, maybe one day I will be forgiven, I'll be able to look at the mirror seeing a whole person and not a collection of fragments._

* * *

><p>Morgan finds her at the bureau "Hotch told you were joining us after psych eval and I don't know why I had the feeling I would have found you here" he approaches her with his velvet voice.<p>

"So, you found me" she smiles tired "Now what?"

"Now I take you to the bar for a toast. We saved a life thanks to you today" he closes the file she's reading, pushing it aside and sits on the corner of her desk.

"Then why doesn't it taste like a happy ending at all?" she inquires back at him, "three murders are still unsolved; four more lives have been taken out of a stupid revenge; Portman's reputation and family are shred into pieces; Caine and his girlfriend will spend the rest of their life in jail" she insists.

"It was a tough case for all of us, and exactly for this reason one shouldn't be alone in nights like this" he counters softly "But this is not the problem, you've been fidgety over the past days and something's definitely up with you"

"Damn, profilers…" she drops a pencil in defeat.

He chuckles and looks at the paper she's handing him "I've been cleared by the shrink. I can officially come back to the team if you want me to" she explains unenthusiastically.

Derek takes a look at the paper, then at her. He furrows "What's wrong?"

"I'm kind of scared. I know I've changed after being through all this, but what if I haven't changed for the better, what if I can't cope with the job or I'm not good for the team anymore" she reveals stealing a glance at him.

"Emily, you've been to the hell and back, and you need to take one step at a time and remember you're not alone. You can count on me, as well as on the rest of the team" he reassures her.

A brief smile appears on her face at the memory of an old conversation. Derek leans closer and raises her chin till her gaze is leveled to his "I'm not letting you go, ever. Now come with me, a toast is waiting for you"

She can't help a smile and complies following him.

When they join the rest of the team at the bar, she feels the familiar warmth running through her bones, the reassuring feeling of being back home after a long journey, of being loved and accepted.

She closes her eyes as the smoked flavor of whiskey fills her mouth and runs down her throat finally spreading a burning chill through her chest; the alcohol and the miscellany of feelings of the past days sending a hot shiver down her spine.

Morgan confabulates something with Hotch and shows him a paper he took unseen from her desk; then the chief looks at her and rises his glass with a rare smile followed by the rest of the company "Welcome back to the team Special Supervisory Agent Emily Prentiss".

* * *

><p><em>Hope you liked how it went down... I'm happy to receive comments and requests if you have any!<em>


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